


Between Heaven and us is an opening

by liminal_mess



Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Established Relationship, Ficlet, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, Immortal Husbands Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova, Kissing, Light Angst, M/M, Mention of Gore, Nightmares, Past Violence, Post-Movie: The Old Guard (2020), lets play how many pet names i can fit into one ficlet, referenced temporary character death, these immortal husbands wouldn't leave my head until I wrote this, they're so in love and i'm upset
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-11
Updated: 2020-08-11
Packaged: 2021-03-06 03:27:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,382
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25842811
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/liminal_mess/pseuds/liminal_mess
Summary: "It’s been a few days since the events of London and their escape to a safehouse when Joe jolts awake in the early dawn, Nicky’s full name escaping his lips in a scream. "
Relationships: Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Comments: 8
Kudos: 232





	Between Heaven and us is an opening

It’s been a few days since the events of London and their escape to a safehouse when Joe jolts awake in the early dawn, Nicky’s full name escaping his lips in a scream. 

Nicky awakens besides him immediately and sits up, tense and alert, already shielding Joe since he always sleeps closest to the door. He scans the small room and realizes quickly that there’s no one else there. Just the two of them, in the pale morning light coming in through the sheer blinds. 

He turns his attention to Joe once he’s sure there’s no threat. His love has his arm over his face and is breathing heavily.

“Amore mio, what is wrong? Are you alright?” Nicky lies back down and moves Joe’s arm gently away from his face, intertwining their fingers together. 

“I- I had a nightmare. We were back inside the lab in London. That horrible man shot you in your mouth and you died in front of me. I kept waiting and waiting for you to wake up but you didn’t. I called for help but no one came. I was screaming your name in the dream when I finally woke up.” He swallows thickly, eyes glossed over, still lost in the nightmare.

Nicky murmurs soothingly, cupping the side of his face with the other hand. “I’m so sorry you had to see that again. But I did come back, Yusuf. I am and will always be here, ya amar.” 

“I know. I know. It's just that I haven’t watched you be killed that gruesomely in a long time, at least not when I wasn’t just as badly hurt too. God, Nico, there was a hole in the back of your head, pieces of your skull strewn on the ground as I cradled your arms, waiting.” He half sits up and reaches over to palm the back of Nicky’s head, hands shaking, as if he is expecting the hole to still be there.

Nicky stills, letting him touch and hoping it will at least ease his mind a little. 

“I would kill that man again with my bare hands if I hadn’t already,” he gets out through gritted teeth as he runs his hands through Nicky’s hair roughly. The urgent touches turn into gentle ones carding through his hair as the man lays back down, anger gone just as quickly as it had flared up. He seems satisfied with the solidness of Nicky's skull as they stare into each other's eyes, curled into brackets facing each other. 

“Yes, I think you made that very clear.” Nicky chuckles dryly, trying to distract him, though he knows it won’t work, not when Joe gets like this. 

The ghost of a smile that Joe returns doesn’t get close to reaching his eyes. Nicky can tell he has more to say so he stays quiet and lets him form the words.

“I know I’m being silly. I’ve seen you die hundreds of times before, some of them by my own hands. And every time you've come back to me, healed. Though the times we killed each other have long faded and been overshadowed by all the times we have saved each other by now.” He pauses to exhale and to look at Nicky softly for a moment, before he continues. 

“It’s selfish and I’m so worried about Andromache too, but when you died that way- after we found out that she had lost her immortality-I was so irrationally panicked as I waited for you to come back, that you had lost yours too. “ 

“I understand, Yusuf. You're not silly. I can’t pretend the risk that one of us could lose our immortality hasn’t been more present in my thoughts too.” 

“I don’t know what I would do if I lost you, Nico, I-“ Joe doesn’t, can’t, finish the sentence, just closes his eyes instead, one hot tear escaping the side of his eye. 

Nicky feels the love for his Joe surge up inside him like a monsoon. It’s always there, ever-present like another limb, but sometimes the force of it threatens to drown him from the inside. His Yusuf, with a heart so tender and loving, even after all this time. 

Nicky makes a soft, pained sound and surges forward, kissing the side of Joe’s eye, his lips becoming wet as they meet the fallen tear there. Then his other eye. His forehead, his nose, his cheeks. As if to remind and ground Joe in his aliveness. And finally, he kisses his mouth. Joe opens up to him, kissing back softly. 

He moves back just enough to whisper, “You are not going to lose me. I would will the universe to bring me back with just the sheer force of my longing to be by your side. I will never, never leave you, vita mia.” 

The words seem to comfort Joe, even though they both know their love too may one day have to bow to the unpredictable cruelty of the universe. But the reassurance is enough, for now. The tension bleeds slowly out of his body and he closes the tiny distance again to kiss Nicky urgently, rougher this time, as if his lips can tether them both to the earth, together. They kiss like that for as long as they can, open mouthed and desperate. 

Eventually, one of them has to breathe so Joe breaks the kiss, and lays his head on Nicky’s chest. The other mans’s arms come up to hold him immediately, instinctual. Everything in him is made to protect Joe, though a part of him feels helpless at times like these, when the enemy is inside Joe's head and all he can do is touch and soothe and tell him how much he loves him. And it still doesn't feel like enough. 

“What do you need?” Nicky asks, after a few moments of lying there together, Joe radiating warmth in his arms, relishing in the safety of the present. 

_Name it. Anything, everything. I would tear the world asunder for you_ , _part oceans for you_ , he adds in his head. The words feel like too much to say in the quiet of the room and at the same time, can't fully capture what he wants to convey. That's why they are always reaching for other languages, he thinks. One language, especially the English language, is too limited for everything they have meant and mean to each other. 

“Read to me?” Joe replies after thinking about it, moving his head back slightly to look up at Nicky. 

Nicky smiles down at him, touched by the simple request. He raises himself up on one arm and pushes Joe’s curls back gently. “Mm, which one? Dante or Adonis?” He says, naming the authors of two of the few books they carry with them wherever they go. 

“Hmm. Adonis. Although you reading to me in Arabic might take this strange night somewhere else.” Joe says, chuckling lightly. Nicky tries not to let the flood of relief that fills him up at the sound of Joe chuckle show on his face. 

Except, Joe knows him too well, could read him with his eyes closed. He leans up for a quick peck, his turn to soothe. “I'll be okay, habibi.” 

Nicky simply nods because he knows this, that they've been through everything and this too will pass. He reaches over to the bedside table, where their pile of five worn and well-read book lie and grabs the second one from the top. 

He flips through the pages as Joe settles back down, his head nestled on the crook of the other man's neck. Nicky hears him breathe in deeply. Breathing him in.

The monsoon threatens to overflow again but Nicky resists the urge to kiss him immediately and focuses on finding the poem he wants. He finds it a few pages in and plants a quick kiss on Joe’s forehead first, a small offering to his soothe his urge. Then he begins: 

“We travel upon the Ark, in mud and rain,

Our oars promises from God. 

We live—and the rest of Humanity dies. 

We travel upon the waves, fastening

Our lives to the ropes of corpses filling the skies.

But between Heaven and us is an opening,

A porthole for a supplication....” 

**Author's Note:**

> I know Joe is shown as the poetic one in the movie but I wanted to see that side of Nicky come out too a little. Also, I wrote this last night at 3am because they wouldn't leave my head as the tag says lmao so sorry for any grammar issues/typos. Any comments will be v much appreciated and will go straight to my heart.
> 
> I'm sure you've come across some of these if you're read other Joe/Nicky but:  
> amore mio = my love, vita mia = my life. Ya amar = my moon/my most beautiful, habibi = my love. (If these aren't fully accurate, I apologize, I just googled some stuff, don't speak Italian or Arabic, sadly). 
> 
> The title is from the poem that Nicky reads at the end by Adonis, a 20th century Syrian poet. The quoted poem is here: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/49323/the-new-noah. I know it's religious but it reminded me of the immortal crew.


End file.
